New UNICEF study shows MDGs for children can be reached faster with focus on most disadvantaged

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New UNICEF study shows MDGs for children can be reached faster with focus on most disadvantaged

NEW DELHI, 7 September 2010 – The global community can save millions of lives by investing first in the most disadvantaged children and communities, according to a new UNICEF study released today. Such an approach would also address the widening disparities that are accompanying progress toward the MDGs.

The new findings are presented in two publications: Narrowing the Gaps to Meet the Goals and Progress for Children: Achieving the MDGs with Equity, UNICEF’s signature data compendium.

While great progress is being made in international efforts to meet the Millennium Development Goals, much more needs to be done over the next five years.

By comparing the effectiveness of different strategies for delivering critical health interventions to those in greatest need, the study found that targeting to the poorest and most disadvantaged children could save more lives per US $1 million spent than the current path.

“Our findings challenge the traditional thinking that focusing on the poorest and most disadvantaged children is not cost-effective,” said Anthony Lake, UNICEF’s Executive Director. “An equity-focused strategy will yield not only a moral victory – right in principle – but an even more exciting one: right in practice.”

The study was undertaken in consultation with a range of outside experts, who described the main findings as both surprising and significant.

“The results of the UNICEF study made me think that the equity focus can be persuasive on an instrumental as well as a values basis,” said Lawrence Haddad, Director of the respected Institute of Development Studies, Sussex, author of the blog, Development Horizons, and a participant in the working group of outside experts who reviewed the study’s preliminary modeling.

Key findings of the UNICEF study include:

An equity-focused approach improves returns on investment, averting many more child and maternal deaths and episodes of stunting than the alternative.

Using the equity approach, a US $1 million investment in reducing under-five deaths in a low-income, high-mortality country would avert an estimated 60% more deaths than the current approach.

Because national burdens of disease, ill health and illiteracy are concentrated in the most impoverished child populations, providing these children with essential services can greatly accelerate progress towards the MDGs and reduce disparities within nations.

Progress for Children: Meeting the MDGs with Equity, UNICEF’s signature report on progress toward the MDGs, presents evidence of disparities across a range of key indicators, including between developing and industrial nations, between richest and poorest quintiles within nations, between rural and urban populations, and between boys and girls.

Key data include:

In India, a child born in the poorest 20 percent of households is three times more likely to be underweight compared to a child born in the richest 20 percent.

Despite great strides towards achieving gender parity in primary education over the past decade, girls and young women in developing regions remain at a considerable disadvantage in access to education, particularly at the secondary level.

In india, a mother belonging to the richest 20 per cent household is almost five times more likely to have a skilled attendant at delivery than a mother belonging to the poorest 20 per cent household.

The poorest 20 per cent of households in India are thirty-six times less likely to use improved sanitation facilities in comparison to the richest 20 per cent.

The UNICEF reports are being released in conjunction with a report by Save the Children, "A Fair Chance at Life: Why Equity Matters for Children," which focuses on MDG 4, reducing under-5 mortality by two thirds between 1990 and 2015. The Save the Children report examines the disparities in progress on child survival between the wealthy and less well-off in countries around the world. It asserts that reaching marginalized communities is the key to reducing inequities and achieving MDG 4.

“The Millennium Declaration was designed to improve the lives of the world’s most disadvantaged people,” said Lake. “We believe this study’s findings can have a real effect on global thinking about how we are pursuing the MDGs, and about human development generally -- helping us to improve the lives of millions of vulnerable children.”